April 1

Hope everyone had a nice Easter however they celebrated (or didn't). We here don't celebrate many holidays. Most are so commercialized and we are more than tired of being sold to. It is now April 1 so the year is already one-quarter gone. It is also April Fools' Day so I am being more skeptical of stories I am reading.

One such set of stories appeared on The Bulwark's Morning Shots. One claims that the Miami Herald obtained an "extremely confidential" copy of an order in Judge Aileen Cannon's chambers setting a firm trial date for Trump on June 3. I am waiting for more extensive confirmation--especially since the alleged order is dated for April 1. Another claims that Mitt Romney is going to announce his exit from the Senate to join Biden's administration as a special advisor along with other prominent Republicans. However, on second (third and fourth) reading, I am pretty certain that it is a prank. I have linked to it in case you want a bit of a chuckle.

OK--now for something not a joke. Mehdi Hassan posted this piece on his new site taking apart Netanyahu's claim that only 13,000 Hamas fighters killed in Gaza. He took the Prime Minister's estimate that 1 civilian was killed for every 1 to 1.5 Hamas fighters and comes up with about 26,000 Gaza's killed. It appears that nearly EVERY male Palestinian corpse was counted as a Hamas fighter. Really?? That reminds me of the casualty figures that came out in the last years of Vietnam when "if it was dead and Vietnamese, it was VietCong." It gave the powers-that-were the illusion of success.

Found this by way of Naked Capitalism and it describes a trend I am not at all comfortable. I have said for sometime that I don't want my refrigerator keeping tabs on what foods I consume or telling me when I am low of anything. I don't want any of my other appliances reporting anything back to anyone. Today I replaced my "smart" phone with a flip phone which seems to have some of the same capability but will be easier for me to use. All I have to do is pick up the phone flip it open and put in a phone number (if making a call) or talk (if answering a call.) The features I don't use I can more easily ignore. Simple is better.